South Africa's democracy thirty years on - hope and disillusionment

The voter turnout for this historic election was high by any measure. Of the 22,7 million adults at the time, over 19 million adults voted. Voter turnout was highest amongst black people and particularly high among black youth at 93%. The African National Congress, campaigning with the magnetic slogan – a better life for all – secured the biggest chunk of the votes at 62.65 % or over 12 million people. Trailing second was the party that presided over apartheid – the National Party –with over 3.9 million votes, amounting to a total of 20.39 %. The Zulu-nationalist party – Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) secured 10.54 of the vote – an impressive number given its refusal to sign on to the elections until eight days before the polls were due to take place.

Although 27 April is marked on SA’s history calendar as a Freedom Day, the voting itself was conducted over several days, from 26 – 29 April, with different slots marked for different categories like the elderly and the infirm.

Though widely praised as a miracle, the events leading to 27 April 1994 were some of the most turbulent in the nation’s history. Determined to hold on to the powers and privileges afforded by apartheid, sections of the white establishment – upper echelons of the security forces and senior ministers in government – worked with a range of interests to unleash violence, terror, fear and chaos on black working-class townships. Between 1985 and 1994, violence engulfed industrial districts in towns and cities close to Johannesburg as well as Kwa-Zulu Natal, the second most populated region of the country, resulting in the deaths of over 20,000 people. On their way to work, workers in these incidents were thrown out of moving trains. There were bullets fired into the vigils attended by mourners. During the dead of night, whole families were wiped off in massacres. The nation was on the brink of a precipice, with thousands of people being uprooted and many going missing.

The talks for a new settlement collapsed on the back of state-sponsored massacres and the fightback by fringe white right and separatist groups. The most politically significant of these massacres took place in the township of Boipatong some 70 kilometres from Johannesburg. Over 40 people including a 9-month-old child were killed and maimed on 17 June 1992 while attending a funeral service. The ANC responded to this act by withdrawing from the negotiations table, citing the apartheid regime’s complicity in the violence gripping the townships at the time.

For most of 1992 and 1993, there was bloodshed and fatal altercations between the ANC-aligned township residents and migrant workers staying in single-sex hostels, which made up the IFP's social base.

On April 10 1993 talks for a transfer of power from the white minority to a democratically elected government had just resumed when Chris Hani, the charismatic Chief of Staff of the ANC’s military wing and General Secretary of the South African Communist Party (SACP), was shot and killed outside his east Johannesburg home. Hani’s assassination sent shockwaves across the country. Using the moment, the ANC increased pressure on the parties to reach a settlement. It also tabled more urgent demands including the announcement of the election date and the immediate installation of an interim government.

P. Bonner und N. Nieftagodien, Ekurhuleni: the making of an urban region, 2012.

A look at 27 April 1994 election day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gevTpcJTtHM

R. Jennings, D. Everatt und G. Masebe, Young people at the polls: youth voting in the 1994 and 1995 elections Indicator South Africa, Vol.15, Issue 4, January 1998, pp. 9 – 14. https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.10520/AJA0259188X_1456

1994 National and Provincial Elections: https://www.elections.org.za/content/uploadedfiles/NPE%201994.pdf

Violence in the time of negotiations: The Boipatong massacre: https://www.saha.org.za/news/2014/May/violence_in_the_time_of_negotiations_the_boipatong_massacre.htm